there seems to be a spate of stories today involving politicians trying to sneak one by us, fine print, and then hoping we wouldn t notice. so with a hat tip to rev al, i think it s time to play, nice try, guys. friday, president obama came before the american people and introduced new oversight of government spying designed to ensure the protection of americans privacy rights. we re forming a high-level group of outside experts to review our entire intelligence and communications technologies. i m tasking this independent group to step back and review our capabilities. particularly our surveillance technologies. and they ll consider how we can maintain the trust of the people, how we can make sure that there absolutely is no abuse in terms of how these surveillance technologies are used. independent group of
i m tasking this independent group to step back and review our capabilities, especially our surveillance technologies. great idea. outside experts, independent group. so who is he going to get to create it? in a moment oemo this group, th independent group of outside experts will be established by none other than james clapper, president s director of national security. this group will brief their findings through clapper and make final recommendations through clapper. so just to be clear, the man who already oversees all of or spy agencies is now over seeing creating a panel to see if they re using those technologies appropriately. clapper testified to congress earlier this year about the nsa and that briefing did not go so well truthwise.
transparency. i never made claim that is all the surveillance technologies that had developed since the time some of these laws had been put in place somehow didn t require additional reforms. that s exactly what i called for. i signed an executive order well before mr. snowden leaked this information that provided whistle blower intelligence to the community. it was a tough sell. trevor tim asked, does president barack obama think we are stupid? the fact is he s had years to initiate a debate and instead stifled it. one thing everyone can agree on, both the debate and the debate about the debate will tonight. matt, what did you make of the president s announcement on friday and his intentions here? i m all for a mend it, don t end it approach. i have been in the camp that assumed this stuff is going on. i m more troubled by google and
before mr. snowden made these leaks. my preference, and i think the american people s preference, would have been for a lawful, orderly examination of these laws. a thoughtful, fact based debate. that would then lead us to a better place. because i never made claims that all the surveillance technologies that have developed since the time some of these laws have been put in place somehow didn t require potentially some additional reforms. that s exactly what i called for. so the fact is, is that mr. snowden has been charged with three felonies. if, in fact, he believes that what he did was right, then like every american citizen, he can come here, appear before the
before mr. snowden made these leaks. my preference, and i think the american people s preference, would have been for a lawful, orderly examination of these laws, a thoughtful, fact-based debate, that would then lead us to a better place, never made claims that all the surveillance technologies that have developed since the time some of these laws have been put in place, somehow didn t require potentially additional reforms. that s exactly what i called for. so, the fact is that mr. snowden has been charged with three felonies. if in fact he believes that what he tide he did was right,